There are known and commercially available a variety of machines for stuffing ground meat into a casing. Such machines usually have a hopper from which the meat is fed continuously into a casing after which the casing is twisted or tied to form links. The known and commercially available machines of this type are relatively complex and quite expensive so that the small meat or sausage producer usually cannot justify the necessary expenditure for such machines. Particularly, the machines that operate under a vacuum in order to withdraw air from the meat are expensive while the less expensive machines that do not use vacuum leave an undesirable amount of air in the meat thus lessening its shelf life.
Moreover, the machines that both stuff and link are extremely expensive. Thus, many meat processors use a simpler machine that stuffs the entire rope, and the links are then formed on a separate linking machine. Also, with the stuffer-linker machines, rather elaborate mechanisms are employed to prevent the casing from slipping on the stuffing horn while the links are formed. Slippage is a problem especially with artificial casings, and therefore very close tolerances must be maintained in the manufacture of the stuffing horn further adding to the cost of the machine.
It is therefore an object of the invention to provide a simple inexpensive stuffing machine that will permit the maximum amount of air to be removed from the meat during the entire stuffing process.
It is a further object of the invention to provide an improved metering device that permits an accurate and controlled amount of meat to be fed into the casing producing links that are consistently accurate in their size and weight.
It is a further object of the invention to provide an improved meat stuffing machine having a relatively inexpensive stuffing horn that easily and simply handles all types of casings without the necessity of using an additional mechanism to twist the casing. This permits the stuffing machine to also serve as a semi-automatic linking machine.